Menes' Victory

Author

File Description

IL45

Posted on 03/13/13 @ 02:59 PM

File Details

Version:

Version 1.3 (Enhanced Edition)

Difficulty:

Normal

This scenario is my painstakingly created attempt at recreating the unification of upper and lower Egypt, c.3150 BC. It was made with COTN v1.3.0.1, and probably will crash if you use it with any other version.

I have made the scenario as a map that I want to play- it fits my playing style, and focuses on the 'grand city' aspect of CotN (the most important part of the game), with plenty of things to do on the world map to make it more interesting. It might not be action-packed enough for those who like more militaristic scenarios, but it has a fair amount of fighting in it too.

It is semi-historical; in that I tried to stay true to the spirit of this ancient era of Egyptian history to as large an extent as possible. There are notable exceptions for the sake of making gameplay "fun"; you can build pyramids even though it is a little too early yet in the period in which it takes place. I have also included trade with Lebanon and Nubia, which really didn't occur until around the 6th dynasty; once again, this is added to make it more interesting and fun to play. Also, some monuments and resource sites do not necessarily have an historical basis. All crops are available- wheat, barley, onions, and lettuce, even though really the only main crop ever grown in this period was plain old barley. Lastly, the game map contains grapes, which are at least 600-700 years too early to be domesticated... but I like them so I have included them.

The scenario does hold true to history in the location and selection of the city-sites. I have located cult temples and religion centres in or near the cities where they actually originated. The unification of Egypt in this game is largely an economic one, but it has plenty of war for the bloodthirsty too.

The world-map model tries to replicate a traditional model of cities being assessed taxes in the form of goods, which they pay to the King and his bureaucracies. Each nome is essentially an independent entity, so long as they pay their taxes to the king and reports to his government. This too is true to the historical model.

This scenario is basically built on a sandbox principle- though you have an ultimate goal, you can delay perusing that goal for as long as you wish; the scenario isn't "won" until you found the city of Men-Nefer (which will be a hard-won achievement in the end).

The game map is fairly large, though slightly smaller than the map of "Son of Ra".

The gameplay itself is fairly easy; the map has plenty of open space to build and is rich in the abundant life and everything a healthy city needs. World map trade and tribute from vassal cities will fill in the other gaps nicely. You will not feel rushed at all to pursue your goals; in fact, final victory in this scenario will undoubtedly take many hours of gameplay to achieve. While resources and city-building will not be needlessly difficult for the player, there is a fairly limited supply of warm bodies at his disposal to begin with. It should be enough to get a large city going, but you will find you need more once you start building the large army that you need to win. Military is nothing fancy, enemies do not regenerate once vanquished, you are simply given an opportunity to move onto the next, bigger and badder enemy base to conquer, until the last fortress falls. Enemy bases will spawn raiders, however the first enemy city you encounter will not; the war won't begin until you've actually started fighting it.

I have tested it through as much as I can, but please do post here if you find any nasty surprises in the map.

This scenario was quite a labour of love Beginnings are always interesting and exciting. I hope some people get many hours of enjoyment from playing it.